Tuesday, October 25, 2016

This Is The Point is a play about two couples: a man and woman who have cerebral palsy, and a man and woman who have a child with cerebral palsy. One of the actors uses a head
pointer to communicate with an alphabet board. “The play is about love, sex and
disability,” says Dan Watson, a co-writer and actor whose son Bruno, 7, has
cerebral palsy. He co-leads Ahuri Theatre,
which is producing the play with The Theatre Centre. “The themes we circle
around are love, parenthood, communication and acceptance.” BLOOM interviewed
Dan to learn more.

BLOOM: Tell us about Ahuri Theatre.

Dan Watson: It was formed by me and a
few other people who went to school together in France. We did a lot of
physical theatre there. We worked with mask and clown and mime and tragedy.
Ahuri works in Japan and Canada. We’ve done a lot of shows that incorporate
different languages. When we write, we write on our feet, not sitting at a
computer. We get in a space and we do improvisation and the script comes at the
end. This Is The Point evolved more out of my personal life. Our older son
Bruno is non-verbal and I wanted to do something that looked at language that
went beyond words.

BLOOM: I'd love to hear more about Bruno.

Dan Watson: Bruno really likes
rough-housing, loud music, wrestling, and going fast. His
brother Ralph is four, and the two of them have fun running around with Bruno in
his walker and Ralph on his bike. To communicate, he may look at things he
wants, or vocalize or gesture with his arms. He uses an eye-gaze system and
some low-tech tools like a communication book. We want to find a way for him to
consistently advocate for himself—not just by saying ‘no,’ but by actively
saying ‘I want to do this.’

BLOOM: In This Is The Point, one of
the characters has cerebral palsy and uses a head pointer and alphabet board to
communicate. Why did you want to do this play?

Dan Watson: Tony Diamanti is the actor
who is non-verbal and uses a chair. We met Tony through another project called
What Dream It Was. We invited him to work on that, but he said he wanted to do
his own play and he sent us a play. I was struck by his voice, his sense of
humour, his passion and his wanting to share his sexual experiences and to make
sure that people know that people with disabilities are sexual human beings
that live very full lives. I think a lot of people in the general public don’t
see someone who looks like Tony that way. I thought this is exactly the kind of
opportunity that I want to make happen. If Bruno was older and wanted to do
this, this is something I’d hope someone would take on and work with him on.

I didn’t know where it would go, but
we started to work on this play. We wanted all four of us to be on stage.

BLOOM: So in addition to you and Tony,
there is Liz MacDougall, who is Tony’s partner in real life, and Christina
Serra, who is your partner?

Dan Watson: Yes. At first we tried to make the play the way you usually do. It
was very physical, with scenes and blackouts. But it wasn’t working for Tony.
We were trying to fit him in to something that wasn’t going along with the way
he communicates and lives. So we started to have Tony communicate the stories
himself, but then we didn’t fit in. We’ve come to something where we talk in
the show and we talk with the audience and we also jump into scenes that are
re-enactment scenes. By the nature of who we are, these scenes all have
connection to disability.

A lot of the stories we share are, for
lack of a better term, trying to normalize in a certain way disability—and
sharing our lives, rather than lecturing or trying to teach people. We model
the way we work together so we don’t hide the transitions that take a long
time. It takes a long time to get set up and there’s nothing wrong with that,
whereas we live in a society that is obsessed with speed. We’re asking people
to stop and slow down and be with us and to feel that that’s okay. It takes
Tony a long time to communicate because we have him talking directly to the
audience and the audience has to read along with him.

BLOOM: In a trailer for the play,
Christina makes a comment about how we’re not as inclusive as we think we are.
Then she says: ‘You don’t know about disability until you’re opened up into
that world.’ It seems like your play might be giving people an immersive
experience into that world.

Dan Watson: That might just be the
thing we want to have happen to an audience. When people encounter disability,
it can bring up a lot of different feelings, and some uncomfortable ones. What
we want to do is share and open them up to that world and show them that it’s
okay that people with disabilities live all different kinds of ways. Just like
anyone, they have struggles and happy moments.

BLOOM: I found it very interesting
what you said about speed. Our culture glorifies speed. This is something I’ve
been aware of because my son has a number of physical disabilities and he can’t
move quickly.

Dan Watson: We were initially trying
to fit the play into a form that was about speed. We need to move onto the next
scene, keep it going, keep the energy up. Then we realized that’s not what this
group is bringing, and slowing down is not a bad thing. That’s when things
opened up for us. We presented it a couple of times and audience members say
they feel at ease and there’s a real casualness to the show. We’re welcoming
them and opening them up into our world for a moment.

Of course this is part of a bigger
conversation. I don’t have any visions of everyone coming away from the show
knowing everything about disability, nor do I want that. We’re just sharing our
lives and our perspectives. I do hope they go away and take us with them, and
that maybe we pop up into their heads in their daily lives when they need
us—perhaps even when they’re encountering people who don’t have disabilities
but who are different.

BLOOM: Did you have experience with
disability before Bruno was born?

Dan Watson: No. I don’t think I even
knew what cerebral palsy was before Bruno was born. His life has opened me up
into a whole different community. I have these memories of being in school and
kids with disabilities were in chairs on one side of the playground watching
us. And I look back and think ‘Oh my god,’ I didn’t even think about them.

BLOOM: Have your thoughts about
disability evolved?

Dan Watson: Yes, and with this show
too. At first we were focused on the way Tony communicates. When I see people
encounter him it’s a bit of a novelty—they’ve never seen something like that
before. Then Tony says: ‘Pay attention to what I’m saying, not how I’m saying
it.’ Over the course of working on this show in a funny way disability is less
of an issue. The differences aren’t so apparent to me anymore. Tony is who he
is and it’s only when I see other people encounter him that I go ‘Oh yea, Tony
is non-verbal, yet I forgot in a funny way.’

BLOOM: I think having a child who
doesn’t speak conventionally is challenging because verbal speech is so prized
in our culture.

Dan Watson: It is really hard. There’s
constant pressure from outside in terms of how Bruno interacts with people.
There’s a scene in the show where I’m on the playground and that’s always a big
challenge because Bruno and I go to the park all the time. We go on the
accessible swing and I’m always having to negotiate with kids who want to be on
the swing. And explain to them who Bruno is and why he can’t go on the other
swings. You have to be this advocate and do all this explaining when you just
want to hang out on the swing. Then you also wonder—what does Bruno think? I’m
sure he knows this is going on.

We were just talking this morning about subtle communication things that you
know with your child that other people don’t know. You probably see this with
Ben. It’s hard when you can see what’s going on but others can’t seem to see
it.

BLOOM: What’s been the greatest
challenge of producing this show? Was it altering it from a traditional format?

Dan Watson: Yes. But that’s also the
artistic—that’s what artists need to do is push beyond what they know, and that
includes disability but also how you make things work. Usually people who don’t
have disabilities are cast as characters with disabilities. That’s because it’s
easier for the show—and the way the show is done.

But if you take a step back and say no, we’re working with people who are
differently abled on stage, there are a lot of opportunities that present
themselves. That’s really exciting as an artist. Instead of doing it the same
old way you’ve always done it, it can generate amazing, different work that
you’ve never seen anywhere else. It’s all about who’s in the room. Sometimes
that’s a challenge—it’s taken a long time for us and trying different things.
But the challenge is actually part of the reward, as well as what’s really
engaging.

This Is The Point runs from Nov. 4 to
20. Book your tickets here. Photo below of Dan Watson, Christina Serra with their children Ralph and Bruno.

1 comments:

Oh my goodness, I would LOVE to see this!!!!! So much about this resonates with me - my background in theatre, my son who is non-speaking... finding a voice is such a powerful theme in theatre. Thank you for sharing, Louise!

The BLOOM blog welcomes comments from readers on issues that affect parents of children with disabilities. We moderate comments to ensure they’re on-topic and respectful. We don’t post comments that attack people or organizations.